Please Do Not Tailgate

We have had snow and sleet fall here in Columbus, Ohio recently. Such weather usually brings about comments from people I know about road conditions and how bad people drive here in Central Ohio. One comment I remember from last winter still gnaws at me. A Facebook friend asked other drivers not to stop too fast when the roads are slippery. If you think the drivers in front of you are stopping to fast, you are following too close.

I have mostly overcome my road rage, but I still have an issue with tailgaters. I overcame my road rage by assuming that I am invisible whenever I get behind the wheel of a car. This technique is not always effective when dealing with tailgaters. I pull over and let tailgaters pass whenever I can, but sometimes it would be dangerous to pull over to the side of the road. I have the impression that many drivers do not understand what a clear and safe distance is. They seem to think that they are supposed to follow as closely as possible to the vehicle in front of them. They do not seem to understand that they would not be able to stop in time if the car in front of them were to stop suddenly.

Snow and ice make maintaining a clear and safe distance between your vehicle and the vehicle in front of you even more important. A good way to avoid tailgating is to observe the three second rule. Maintaining a clear and safe distance is much easier to do if you are not texting or talking on the phone while driving. Please do not tailgate.

Racism and Bigotry

A Facebook friend commented on my last blog post. She argued that we are not born racists, but are taught racism. She asked if we do not continue to teach or children to be racists, can we finally be free of racism. I see her point, but I have the impression that we are born racists. I believe that early humans had to be leery of people who looked different than they did. This is a survival mechanism. 100,000 years ago, if you saw someone who looked radically different than you did, it would be a signal that you have new competitors for resources.

There is a difference, though, between racism and bigotry. An educated and open minded person can quickly overcome the shock of seeing another person who looks and sounds different than anyone else they ever met. A person can be racist and still have love for his or her fellow human beings. Many abolitionists believed that Africans were intellectually inferior, but believed that slavery was not justified under any circumstances. Bigotry is different. A bigot has malice in his or her heart for those who are different. Bigotry is learned. I do not believe that we are born bigots, but learn it from our parents, teachers and friends at school. We do need to be careful about what we say around our children about other races, religions and lifestyles. The best way to teach our children not to be bigots is to remember to “Judge not, that ye be not judged.” (Matthew, 7:1) and “Thou hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of thine own eye; and then shalt thou see clearly to cast out the mote out of thy brother's eye.” (Matthew 7:5)

Everyone is Racist

A recent article inthe Atlanta Journal-Constitution reminded me that one of the reasons I started a blog was to address racial issues.  I fear that the more I write about racial issues, the more likely I will be called a racist.  My qualifications for writing about racism and racial politics are that I am the parent of a biracial child and that I have been asked by both black people and white people if I thought they were racist.  I believe that most people perceive me as open minded and not bigoted.  I am a white man who needs to teach his mixed-race son what it means to be a black man in a white man's world.  The place to start is to teach him that everyone is racist.  Some people are openly racist.  Other people may not give racial issues very much thought.  Still other people think they are not racist, or do not wish to be racist.  In our heart of hearts, though, we all think that our own race is superior in some way to the other races of men.  There may be some enlightened individuals who are completely free from racial and ethnic bias, but they are extremely rare.

I believe the teachers who wrote the math worksheets mentioned in the Atlanta Journal Constitution article fall into the category of people who do not give much thought to racial issues.  They did not think through what might happen.  I know from doing market research interviews for textbook publishers that educators value instructional materials that can be used for more than one subject.  The teachers probably came up with the worksheets so that they could use them in history or social studies classes as well as math classes.  Just from reading the article, it seems as though the word problems were not well thought out if the idea was to generate questions about slavery.  The sentences quoted in the article give the impression that whoever wrote the worksheets has a rather flippant attitude about slavery, like they think it is cute to make students figure out how many whippings a slave might receive in a certain period of time.  Without actually seeing the worksheets, a person can get the impression that whoever wrote the worksheets does not take issues associated with slavery as seriously as they should.  That is what happens when you are a person who does not give racial issues very much thought, but has to teach children about racial issues.

Becoming not racist takes a great deal of effort.  It is an effort that must be taken before anyone can hope to teach children to be free of bigotry.  That is one reason we have approval procedures, which the teachers who wrote the math worksheets ignored.

The Columbus Dispatch published my letter to the editor

If you have comments, please post them through the blog.  Thank you.

http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/editorials/2012/01/05/dont-let-politics-divide-facebook-friends.html

Hospitals should not advertise

I heard a story on NPR this morning about how hospitals associated with medical centers have been increasing advertising and marketing themselves more lately.  I have always been irritated with hospitals conducting any kind of advertising.  I doubt that it helps anyone make an informed decision, and it adds to the cost of medical care for everyone.

I believe in a free market, but the provision of medical care is one exception.  Hospitals should not compete with each other.  Advertising will not help us to evaluate which doctor or hospital does a better job of treating a particular condition or providing better care overall.

In a previous post, I proposed the idea that we get rid of health insurance and make the provision of medical care a public service, like police and fire protection.  If a person wants an opinion on which hospital is best for them, they should talk to their doctor.  If they think their doctor is biased because he or she has privileges at a certain hospital, get a second opinion.  I do not see how anyone can get useful information about a hospital from a television ad.  I also have the impression from seeing advertisements for hospitals that they are pandering to hypochondriacs.

Occupy the Schools

I found the Occupy Wall Street movement the most interesting thing about 2011, even though it disappointed me.  It disappointed me because I thought that they would make people aware of the criminal activity in our financial system and the inequality of opportunity that now pervades our society.  Instead, the people who occupied Wall Street and the financial centers of other cities did little more than display a sense of entitlement.

By focusing on the one percent of Americans who have more wealth than the 99 percent of the rest of us, members of the Occupy Wall Street movement failed to convince the rest of us that we need to make profound changes in our financial system and our government in order to restore the equality of opportunity that the authors of the United States Constitution had in mind.  Inequality of income is just a symptom of inequality of opportunity.  Many of us do not have an issue with others having enormous wealth, unless they acquired that wealth by cheating the rest of us.  Occupy Wall Street has said little or nothing about lax enforcement of insider trading laws, and they have said little or nothing about the financial geniuses who rigged the system so that it is harder to tell the difference between investment and speculation.

I thought the Occupy Wall Street movement would try to put pressure on the government to prosecute those who were responsible for the banks having to be bailed out by the government, or at least try to get them fired.  One of my Facebook friends claims that the banks failed because they were forced by the government to give home loans to people who could not pay back the loans.  Neither Occupy Wall Street nor the mass media has addressed this issue.  No one has addressed how the public educational system no longer provides access to opportunity as it once did.  A person who graduates from high school in a wealthy school district has many more college and career opportunities than a person who graduates from high school in a poor school district.  It should not matter whether a person graduates from a rich school or a poor school, but it does.

Occupy Wall Street was correct in protesting on Wall Street instead of protesting at the United States Capitol, because the real power is on Wall Street.  However, it is futile to tell Wall Street that they have too much money and that they should share it with the rest of us.  To bring about change, they need to do much more than complain about how some people have more money than others.  They need to remember that if all of the wealth in America were to be fairly distributed around the world, all Americans would have much less than we do now.  They need to come up with an idea to restructure the tax code so that all schools are equally funded.  If we all receive the same educational opportunities, economic inequalities will be less severe.

Happy Holidays vs. Merry Christmas

I had a short discussion with a co-worker last week about saying “Happy Holidays” instead of “Merry Christmas.” The conversation got interrupted because we were making phone calls, and had to get on with our work. Some of my friends on Facebook have posted comments along the lines of, “It’s Merry Christmas, not Happy Holidays.”

I have not heard anyone complain about anybody saying Merry Christmas for several years. I even forgot myself for a minute, and wished a Jewish person Merry Christmas yesterday. I understand why the controversy arose. Christmas is the most important day on the calendar for most Christians. People who are not Christians may feel as though Christians are trying to force their beliefs on them by saying Merry Christmas. Since Thanksgiving, Hanukkah and New Years Day all arrive close to Christmas, it makes sense to cover them all and not offend anybody by saying Happy Holidays.

“Happy Holidays” sounds so watered down. It just sounds like a person wants to wish others a Merry Christmas in a Politically Correct way. Christians may feel that they are not giving testimony to their faith if they say Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas. Jesus told us not to judge others, but he also said “I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the father but through me.” (John 14:6) He was trying to tell us that we can’t wander into salvation through any old religion. We need a focus, and Jesus came into the world to be that focus. Without a focus, it is easy for us to be led into darkness through false religion.

Those who object to hearing Happy Holidays instead of Merry Christmas may need to ask themselves if they announce their faith at times of year other than Christmas. We celebrate that Jesus came into the world at Christmastime. His birth was an expression of God’s love. We need to remember Good Friday and Easter. Jesus died on the cross on Good Friday so that we could have our sins forgiven by believing that he endured the crucifixion for us. His resurrection on Easter Day was his greatest miracle. The Crucifixion and the Resurrection were the reasons for Christ’s birth.

So, if you want to insist on Merry Christmas instead of Happy Holidays, ask yourself if you are witnessing and evangelizing the rest of the year.